eSIM support in South Africa — A sad affair of limited options

Despite the technology growing increasingly popular abroad, embedded SIMs (eSIMs) are still very limited in South Africa.

More mid-range smartphones are getting eSIMs, after initially only being offered in flagship models from Apple, Huawei, and Samsung.

eSIMs are chips with the same capability as a physical SIM card but are programmable.

That means subscribers could, in theory, easily change to different networks and numbers, with up to five SIMs storable on a single eSIM.

Aside from making it easier to switch between operators, many eSIM providers let users purchase and register an eSIM online.

That is particularly useful when you travel abroad and use a network from another country to avoid expensive roaming charges but don’t want to go through the hassle of going to a store before leaving the airport at your destination.

One MyBroadband reader recently discovered he was able to buy and use a prepaid eSIM for Vodacom’s network in Tanzania.

He found it curious that the operator would launch eSIM in a country with a vastly smaller population and lower smartphone penetration, while still not offering the feature in its much larger home market.

In South Africa, Vodacom and its main rival MTN still require customers to take out a contract to use the feature.

Vodacom was first to market with eSIM support on wearables in March 2019, followed by MTN in October 2019.

MTN told MyBroadband it would launch eSIM support for prepaid phones later in 2022.

It currently supports various manufacturers’ eSIM-enabled smartphones and wearables when used on its MegaTalk, MegaGigs, MegaFlex and Sky contracts.

When an eSIM is provisioned on the handset as the primary device, there is no monthly charge for the eSIM.

“Customers are only charged for secondary eSIM activations coupled with MTN’s One Number service,” MTN said. This lets two devices share voice minutes, data allocations or airtime allocations.

“Both the devices also ring simultaneously when a call is received, and can operate independently to make voice calls or send SMS messages, where applicable,”

Vodacom also offers this value-added service.

Both operators charge R25 per month for the feature.

Unfortunately, neither operator lets you buy or register a SIM online — you must go into a store.

Credit: Sunshine Seeds / Shutterstock.com

Cell C and Telkom are the only networks in the country that offer eSIM on prepaid services.

Cell C quietly added the capability sometime in early 2021, whereas Telkom launched eSIM in August 2021.

However, South Africa’s two smaller networks only offer the service on handsets, not wearables.

“We are experiencing challenges with wearable devices, and we will be turning our focus on these devices for the next phase of eSIM support and provisioning,” Telkom told MyBroadband.

In addition, both networks require customers to visit a store and buy an eSIM voucher to activate the service on a supported device.

Cell C and Telkom also offer eSIM support for handsets bought on contract.

Neither network charges monthly fees for eSIM, but a once-off connection fee is payable.

The table below compares the eSIM services and fees applicable to South Africa’s four major mobile networks.

Now read: Former Vodashop owner says online platforms are killing stores